<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Blood Brothers by Freedoms_Champion</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28942743">Blood Brothers</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Freedoms_Champion/pseuds/Freedoms_Champion'>Freedoms_Champion</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Teen Wolf (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Drama Queen Peter Hale, Family Secrets, Gen, Peter Hale is Not Amused, Talia lied a lot, lazy werewolf things</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 04:14:28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>864</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28942743</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Freedoms_Champion/pseuds/Freedoms_Champion</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter needed his birth certificate to prove he was still alive. It shouldn't have been a big deal, except that he had never personally looked at it before.</p>
<p>The name he found there promised to upend everything he and Derek knew about their relationship.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Derek Hale &amp; Peter Hale</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>40</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Blood Brothers</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Derek scented distress the second before he touched his door. It flooded his nose, acrid and intense, as if someone had just lost a family member. It took a moment of controlled breathing to knock his wolf instincts back enough to identify the person in his loft: Peter.</p>
<p>It wasn’t like his uncle to suffer this much. Derek heaved open the door and slipped inside, braced for a fight.</p>
<p>Apart from the windows, it was dark in his loft. Outside, the sun was setting, but the east-facing windows were already deeply shadowed. It took Derek a moment of searching to find Peter. He wasn’t perched on the spiral staircase or sitting on the couch. Instead, he was huddled against a concrete column, sitting on the floor.</p>
<p>Derek focused his senses and found that no one else, living, dead, or in-between, was in the loft. Whatever had shaken Peter hadn’t happened here. He crossed the floor and sat against the column at right-angles from his uncle.</p>
<p>“What’s wrong?”</p>
<p>“She lied to me. I knew Talia hid so many things, but how could she do this to me?” Peter’s voice was ragged, hardly above a whisper. Paper rustled and he handed Derek a slim folder. He used his wolf sight to read it, since getting up to turn on a light didn’t appeal to him.</p>
<p>“I needed my birth certificate to finalize the paperwork saying my death was a records error. I’d never seen it before.”</p>
<p>Derek almost didn’t hear the words as he stared in astonishment. The bald, typed words left no room for interpretation, but how could they possibly be true?</p>
<p>“Talia wasn’t my sister. She never was. She lied to me!”</p>
<p>Derek set the file aside. “It doesn’t change anything.”</p>
<p>Peter surged to his feet and paced in agitation. “How does it not change anything, Derek? Talia lied to both of us our entire lives! You know, I asked Lydia to read her claws after you were done with them. I knew she had taken something from me, and I needed to know what. She heard a baby crying. I thought it meant Malia, my daughter, but what if it was actually Talia’s greatest secret? This changes everything I’ve ever thought about myself!”</p>
<p>“There must have been a reason,” Derek said, struggling to keep his voice level. Peter always assumed everything was about him, making conversations with him annoying or even infuriating. “But it doesn’t change anything. You’ve always been more like my brother anyway.”</p>
<p>Peter froze. Slowly, he turned back to face Derek.</p>
<p>“Is that the only part of this that matters to you?” he asked in a small voice.</p>
<p>“I know you immediately jumped to how could she lie to you and keep you from everything you should have had as her oldest son. Peter, be realistic. There’s nothing you can do to change any of that. Mom’s gone and she can’t take back the lies or anything else. We’re the only ones left. Cora’s not coming back. So, yeah, that’s the only part that matters. I remember when we looked out for each other. You more than me, because I was a kid and you never let anyone help you anyway. We’ve lied to each other and done hurtful things, but it shouldn’t change the facts. I’ve always looked up to you like my brother.”</p>
<p>Peter’s shoulders slumped. Derek’s eyes had adjusted to the darkness enough to make that out, if not the fine details of his expression. His senses told him more. Peter radiated remorse and a kind of desperate hope.</p>
<p>“It was all those years locked in my own body, you know,” Peter finally said. He sat back down and leaned his head against the column. “I was so angry about the fire. Angry and grieving and terrified. I thought they might come for me while I couldn’t defend myself. Or worse, go after you and Laura when I couldn’t protect you. Over time, the anger burned everything else out of me. By the time I could move again, nothing mattered but revenge. I’m sorry Laura got caught in the middle of that.”</p>
<p>A twist of shame added itself to the other scents. Derek locked his senses down hard. He didn’t want to feel that. Bad enough that Laura was gone. It was worse to know her killer had been her own brother.</p>
<p>“We can’t change the past,” Derek stated firmly. “The only thing that changes is how you and I go forward. I don’t think I can handle it if we keep fighting.”</p>
<p>“You always were so sentimental about family,” Peter responded. A hint of his usual sarcasm finally entered his voice. Derek took it as a relief. “It’ll take some time, Derek. I’ve been out for myself for so long now, I’m not sure I remember how to function in a pack.”</p>
<p>“It took me a long time too. If I can do it, though, someone as smart as you can figure it out.” Derek pushed himself up and held out a hand. Peter regarded him in the darkness for a long moment before he grinned and accepted it. </p>
<p>Derek hauled his brother to his feet.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hi! Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed it! This idea kinda came out of nowhere, but I really like it. There might be more set in the same continuity, who knows!</p>
<p>Comments are welcome and have a fantastic day!</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>